In Reversal, Florida to Take Health Law’s Medicaid Expansion

MIAMI — Gov. Rick Scott of Florida reversed himself on Wednesday and announced that he would expand his state’s Medicaid program to cover the poor, becoming the latest — and, perhaps, most prominent — Republican critic of President Obama’s health care law to decide to put it into effect.

It was an about-face for Mr. Scott, a former businessman who entered politics as a critic of Mr. Obama’s health care proposals. Florida was one of the states that sued to try to block the law. After the Supreme Court ruled last year that though the law was constitutional, states could choose not to expand their Medicaid programs to cover the poor, Mr. Scott said that Florida would not expand its programs.

Mr. Scott said Wednesday that he now supported a three-year expansion of Medicaid, through the period that the federal government has agreed to pay the full cost of the expansion, and before some of the costs are shifted to the states.

“While the federal government is committed to paying 100 percent of the cost, I cannot in good conscience deny Floridians that needed access to health care,” Mr. Scott said at a news conference. “We will support a three-year expansion of the Medicaid program under the new health care law as long as the federal government meets their commitment to pay 100 percent of the cost during that time.”

He said there were “no perfect options” when it came to the Medicaid expansion. “To be clear: our options are either having Floridians pay to fund this program in other states while denying health care to our citizens,” he said, “or using federal funding to help some of the poorest in our state with the Medicaid program as we explore other health care reforms.”

Mr. Scott said the state would not create its own insurance exchange to comply with another provision of the law.

His reversal sent ripples through the nation, especially given the change in tone and substance since the summer, when he said he would not create an exchange or expand Medicaid.

“Floridians are interested in jobs and economic growth, a quality education for their children, and keeping the cost of living low,” Mr. Scott said in a statement at the time. “Neither of these major provisions in Obamacare will achieve those goals, and since Florida is legally allowed to opt out, that’s the right decision for our citizens.”

Mr. Scott now joins the Republican governors of Arizona, Michigan, Nevada, New Mexico, North Dakota and Ohio, who have decided to join the Medicaid expansion. Some, like Gov. Jan Brewer of Arizona, were also staunch opponents of Mr. Obama’s overall health care law.

Shortly before his announcement, the governor received word from the federal government that it planned to grant Florida the final waiver needed to privatize Medicaid, a process the state initially undertook as a pilot project. Mr. Scott, who is running for re-election next year, has heavily lobbied for the waiver, arguing that Florida could not expand Medicaid without it.

Mr. Scott’s support of Medicaid expansion is significant, but is far from the last word. The program requires approval from Florida’s Republican-dominated Legislature, which has been averse to expanding Medicaid under the health care law. The Legislature’s two top Republican leaders said that before making a decision they would consider recommendations from a select committee, which has been asked to review the state’s options.

“The Florida Legislature will make the ultimate decision,” Will Weatherford, the state House speaker, said. “I am personally skeptical that this inflexible law will improve the quality of health care in our state and ensure our long-term financial stability.”

Medicaid, which covers three million people in Florida, costs the state $21 billion a year. The expansion would extend coverage to one million more people.

Mr. Scott’s reversal is sure to anger his original conservative supporters.

The governor “was elected because of his principled conservative leadership against Obamacare’s overreach,” said Slade O’Brien, state director for Americans for Prosperity, an influential conservative advocacy organization. “Hopefully our legislative leaders will not follow in Governor Scott’s footsteps, and will reject expansion.”

During his announcement on Wednesday, Mr. Scott said his mother’s recent death and her lifetime struggle to raise five children “with very little money” played a role in his decision.

“Losing someone so close to you puts everything in a new perspective, especially the big decisions,” he said.

Michael Cooper contributed reporting from New York.

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Wearing the future

A wristwatch that reads your text messages out loud, a jacket that heats up when you're cold, eyeglasses that display directions as you walk down the street.

Gimmicks, or fashion of the future?

Although those products may seem like something out of a James Bond movie, the world's largest technology companies and start-ups alike believe "wearable tech" is the next big frontier, and they have been pouring money and research into developing high-tech clothing and accessories.

"It's a function of time before wearable technology becomes real, and it's closer than a lot of people think," said Gene Munster, senior research analyst at Piper Jaffray. "Eventually, wearable technology is probably going to be your most easy access point to your technology."

Google Inc., the world's largest Internet company, has been testing augmented-reality eyeglasses that feature cameras and use voice recognition. Apple Inc. is reportedly working on a watch that would have some of the same functions as a smartphone.

The idea behind so-called wearables is to integrate technology into everyday basics, but it's more than just inserting a gee-whiz factor into your favorite pair of jeans. Bringing tech into the fold, developers say, will create a more seamless experience with technology that involves fewer devices to carry around and less time rummaging through your purse or pocket.

But there are numerous challenges to overcome before wearable tech can become mainstream. Developers are working on improving battery life, scaling the technology down and making the products affordable.

Companies also need to persuade the public to accept the notion that digital devices and fashion can coexist in one unit by designing wearables that don't look too techie and figuring out what kinds of functions to embed within the products.

"We have a lot of research to do," said Cory Booth, a user experience researcher at Intel, which has a team looking into the potential for wearables. "It's actually more about will people want to do it and how will they want to do it. When people start putting things on their bodies, it becomes very personal."

For now, wearable tech is taking off in the sports and health markets.

Goggles made by Oakley assist snowboarders via a display that integrates GPS capabilities, Bluetooth and sensors that gauge jump analytics such as distance, height and airtime. There's also smartphone connectivity and the ability to locate and track friends via an app.

With the Nike+ FuelBand, a wristband containing an accelerometer, wearers can set daily activity goals and track calories burned on the band's LED display. Data from the FuelBand — which Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook has been seen wearing — can be viewed on a mobile device via an iOS app. The Up by Jawbone wristband and Fitbit wireless activity trackers are similar products that help users eat and sleep better and record their physical activity.

But tech companies have goals that stretch beyond fitness, with the goal of equipping clothing with mini computers and sensors.

The tech-fashion hybrid that has gotten the most attention so far is Google Glass, Web-connected eyeglasses that the company has been previewing to big buzz in recent months. The futuristic glasses are still in the early stages of development under the company's secretive Google X lab.

Wearers can record what they're seeing in real life and broadcast it over a Google+ Hangout, perform a quick Google search and send a hands-free voice message with the glasses. They can view data such as directions and weather on a tiny screen connected to the device, and tell the glasses to take a photo.

"It has been transformative for my lifestyle," Google co-founder Sergey Brin said of Project Glass last year. "That's our job at Google X, to push the edges of technology to where the future might be."

The Mountain View, Calif., company has also filed for a laser projection patent, leading to speculation that Glass wearers will be able to project a virtual touchpad onto their limbs and other surfaces.

Google has taken pre-orders for an early pilot version of the eyeglasses called Glass Explorer Edition from developers who paid $1,500. On Wednesday, the company announced that it would hold a contest for early adopters who want to try out a pair; winners will be offered the chance to buy a Glass Explorer.

Apple could be preparing to take on Google in the wearables space. Last year, the company filed a patent for a "peripheral treatment for head-mounted displays." The device — which people speculate could be a helmet, pair of glasses or a visor — immerses the user with two displays and techniques for filling the peripheral vision with the image being shown, according to reports.

More likely for Apple, at least in the near term, is an iOS smartwatch. In recent weeks the Cupertino, Calif., tech giant set the rumor mill churning with reports that it has a team of 100 developers working to build a curved glass iWatch. Analysts have speculated that the device could be used to make calls and texts, get directions and search the Internet, and would be compatible with the iPhone.

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At least 16 hurt in blast and fire at Kansas City restaurant

At least 16 people were hurt and a popular wine bar was destroyed by an apparent natural gas explosion and ensuing fire at an upscale shopping district in Kansas City, Mo., Tuesday evening.

Residents reported smelling natural gas and seeing utility crews in the area before the conflagration. A strong scent of gas hung in the air afterward.

“Early indications are that a contractor doing underground work struck a natural gas line, but the investigation continues,” Missouri Gas Energy, a natural-gas provider, said in a statement.

The Kansas City Fire Department said the incident was under investigation. “It does seem to be an accident,” Fire Chief Paul Berardi said during a late-night news briefing.

JJ's Restaurant and wine bar, just off Country Club Plaza, had apparently been partially evacuated before the blast occurred about 6 p.m.

"This was happy hour at the restaurant. There were patrons in the restaurant," Berardi said.

No fatalities were reported, but officials brought in cadaver dogs to check the rubble. The Kansas City Star reported that one JJ's employee was missing.

The fire raged for two hours, with thick smoke visible for miles. Victims streamed to hospitals; at least four people were in critical condition.

Initially, police said a car had hit a gas main, but officials later discounted that explanation.

Witnesses described a chaotic scene. 

"I was sitting in my living room folding laundry, and felt in my chest -- and heard -- an explosion," said Jamie Lawless, who lives about two blocks from JJ's. "I started freaking out, and I was looking around, and then I saw other people walking outside. You could see giant black smoke billowing up from the plaza area, and nobody really knew what it was."

Sally McVey, who lives across the street from JJ's, said the fire "was growing exponentially, incredibly quickly. It was not like a fire I’ve seen before, where it takes a long time to spread.”

A crowd gathered to watch firefighters battle the blaze. At an apartment building on JJ's block, a woman on a top-floor balcony called down to onlookers.  "'Is my building on fire?' and everybody says, 'Yes, come down!' " McVey said. "She’s like, 'Oh my gosh,' and a lot of people come out of that building with their computers and dogs. She did too.”

JJ's owner, Jimmy Frantze, was out of town, said Kansas City Mayor Sly James, who used to be a fixture at the restaurant. The business, which boasted a selection of 1,800 bottles, had been on the site for 28 years.

“It was 28 years of a great restaurant, and then it has to end like this,” Frantze told the Kansas City Star while driving back from Oklahoma. “I want to make sure to check on my employees to make sure they are all right.”

Kansas City Police Department's bomb squad and officials with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives were expected to investigate the accident after the search dogs finished looking for victims, Berardi said.

 matt.pearce@latimes.com

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Robin Roberts returns to 'Good Morning America'

NEW YORK (AP) — Five months after undergoing a bone marrow transplant, Robin Roberts is back on television in the morning.

Roberts said Wednesday she'd been waiting 174 days "to say this, good morning America."

The morning-show host is recovering from MDS, a blood and bone marrow disease. She looked thin with close-cropped hair but was smiling broadly, back at work on "Good Morning America" at ABC's studio in New York City.

Roberts was welcomed back in a taped message from President Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle, former ESPN colleagues and Magic Johnson.

ABC announced Roberts will interview the first lady later this week, to be shown next Tuesday.

ABC News President Ben Sherwood came into the studio to give fist bumps to the anchors at the 7:25 a.m. break. He said Roberts' health will be closely monitored to make sure she doesn't overdo it at the beginning.

"This was up to Robin, her doctors and God," Sherwood said. "It's a day that we all rejoice."

ABC didn't miss a beat with her absence, continuing in first place in the ratings after first overcoming NBC's "Today" show last spring. Sherwood said the success with Roberts' absence surprised him.

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Online:

http://abcnews.go.com/

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The New Old Age Blog: The Reluctant Caregiver

Now and then, I refer to the people that caregivers tend to as “loved ones.” And whenever I do, a woman in Southern California tells me, I set her teeth on edge.

She visits her mother-in-law, runs errands, helps with the paperwork — all tasks she has shouldered with a grim sense of duty.  She doesn’t have much affection for this increasingly frail 90something or enjoy her company; her efforts bring no emotional reward. Her husband, an only child, feels nearly as detached. His mother wasn’t abusive, a completely different scenario, but they were never very close.

Ms. A., as I’ll call her because her mother-in-law reads The Times on her computer, feels miserable about this. “She says she appreciates us, she’s counting on us. She thanks us,” Ms. A. said of her non-loved one. “It makes me feel worse, because I feel guilty.”

She has performed many services for her mother-in-law, who lives in a retirement community, “but I really didn’t want to. I know how grudging it was.”

Call her the Reluctant Caregiver. She and her husband didn’t invite his parents to follow them to the small city where they settled to take jobs. The elders did anyway, and as long as they stayed healthy and active, both couples maintained their own lives. Now that her mother-in-law is widowed and needy, Ms. A feels trapped.

Ashamed, too. She knows lots of adult children work much harder at caregiving yet see it as a privilege. For her, it is mere drudgery. “I don’t feel there’s anybody I can say that to,” she told me — except a friend in Phoenix and, anonymously, to us.

The friend, therapist Randy Weiss, has served as both a reluctant caregiver to her mother, who died very recently at 86, and a willing caregiver to her childless aunt, living in an assisted living dementia unit at 82. Spending time with each of them made Ms. Weiss conscious of the distinction.

Her visits involved many of the same activities, “but it feels very different,” she said. “I feel the appreciation from my aunt, even if she’s much less able to verbalize it.” A cherished confidante since adolescence, her aunt breaks into smiles when Ms. Weiss arrives and exclaims over every small gift, even a doughnut. She worked in the music industry for decades and, despite her memory loss, happily sings along with the jazz CDs Ms. Weiss brings.

Because she had no such connection with her mother, whom Ms. Weiss described as distant and critical, “it’s harder to do what I have to do,” she said. (We spoke before her mother’s death.) “One is an obligation I fulfill out of duty. One is done with love.”

Unlike her friend Ms. A, “I don’t feel guilty that I don’t feel warmly towards my mother,” Ms. Weiss said. “I’ve made my peace.”

Let’s acknowledge that at times almost every caregiver knows exhaustion, anger and resentment.  But to me, reluctant caregivers probably deserve more credit than most. They are not getting any of the good stuff back, no warmth or laughter, little tenderness, sometimes not even gratitude.

Yet they are doing this tough work anyway, usually because no one else can or will. Maybe an early death or a divorce means that the person who would ordinarily have provided care can’t. Or maybe the reluctant caregiver is simply the one who can’t walk away.

“It’s important to acknowledge that every relationship doesn’t come from ‘The Cosby Show,’” said Barbara Moscowitz when I called to ask her about reluctance. Ms. Moscowitz, a senior geriatric social worker at Massachusetts General Hospital, has heard many such tales from caregivers in her clinical practice and support groups.

“We need to allow people to be reluctant,” she said. “It means they’re dutiful; they’re responsible. Those are admirable qualities.”

Yet, she recognizes, “they feel oppressed by the platitudes. ‘Your mother is so lucky to have you!’” Such praise just makes people like Ms. A. squirm.

Ms. Moscowitz also worries about reluctant caregivers, and urges them to find support groups where they can say the supposedly unsay-able, and to sign up early for community services — hotlines, senior centers, day programs, meals on wheels — that can help lighten the load.

“Caregiving only goes one way – it gets harder, more complex,” she said. “Support groups and community resources are like having a first aid kit. It’s going to feel like even more of a burden, and you need to be armed.”

I wonder, too, if reluctant caregivers have a romanticized view of what the task is like for everyone else. Elder care can be a wonderful experience, satisfying and meaningful, but guilt and resentment are also standard parts of the job description, at least occasionally.

For a reluctant caregiver, “the satisfaction is, you haven’t turned your back,” Ms. Moscowitz said. “You can take pride in that.”

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Paula Span is the author of “When the Time Comes: Families With Aging Parents Share Their Struggles and Solutions.”

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Filmmaker blends vintage photos with green screen to make drama

Filmmaker Salvador Litvak knew he had a good story about the relationship between Abraham Lincoln and his longtime bodyguard Ward Hill Lamon.

What Litvak didn't know was how to bring the story, which he wrote with his wife, Nina, to the big screen. As an independent filmmaker, he had to produce a period drama with a budget of less than $1 million, a trickle compared to the $65 million it took to make the Oscar-nominated "Lincoln," directed by Steven Spielberg and starring Daniel Day-Lewis.

So Litvak came up with a novel approach: He would use hundreds of Civil War-era photographs to create digital backgrounds that would allow the movie to be filmed entirely on a soundstage in downtown Los Angeles — without having to spend money traveling to film locations and building costly sets.

PHOTOS: Hollywood Backlot moments

The blending of vintage photographs with state-of-the-art green-screen technology, in a process known as cinecollage, allowed "Saving Lincoln" to be made at a fraction of the cost of a conventional period drama.

Although "Saving Lincoln" may not get much attention in the shadow of the critically acclaimed "Lincoln," it is making history in its own way. Other films, such as last year's HBO movie "Hemingway & Gellhorn," have used a similar process of marrying digital effects with historical footage, but "Saving Lincoln" is believed to be one of the first movies to use the process so extensively.

All but one of the 730 shots in the film involved creating digital composites from hundreds of historic photographs that Litvak downloaded for free from a website operated by the Library of Congress.

"This hasn't been done before for a whole film," said Litvak, a UCLA film school graduate who also directed the Passover comedy "When Do We Eat?" "Audiences have never seen anything like this."

Litvak spent about a year assembling the photos, initially as part of his research for the movie, which debuted last week at the Alex Theatre in Glendale.

He collected more than 1,000 photos, including pictures of an unfinished Washington Monument, an unfinished dome on the U.S. Capitol, battlefield scenes from Gettysburg and pictures of the streets of Washington as they looked in the 1860s.

"I would spend hours and hours looking at these prints," Litvak said. "I'd be poking around deep inside these pictures with the cursor from my computer and I suddenly realized — I could move the camera around these photographs instead of the cursor. That was the 'aha' moment."

"Saving Lincoln," which stars Tom Amandes as Lincoln, Penelope Ann Miller as Mary Todd Lincoln and Lea Coco as Ward Hill Lamon, was shot over four weeks in August 2011 on a large soundstage at Atomic Studios in downtown L.A.

Actors worked with just a few historical props in front of a giant 140-foot-wide green screen that would later be filled with the digital composites of the original historic photographs.

The historic photos were fed into a computer program that enabled the cinematographer to match the camera angles and perspective used by the original photographer. Visual effects compositors later would add depth and dimension to the flat images.

To help keep costs down, producers partly relied on volunteer students from the Academy of Art University in San Francisco to assist in the visual effects work.

"The students were instrumental in helping us create this," said Reuben Lim, a producer on the film. "We couldn't have done it without them."

Litvak and his team used social media to spread the word about the film, launching a Facebook page that has more than 50,000 friends. They also relied on the crowd-funding website Kickstarter to raise $62,000 to offset marketing and distribution costs.

North Hollywood prop house History for Hire also gave them a break on rates for such props as a doctor's amputation kit and telegraph equipment used in Spielberg's "Lincoln." (The telegraph equipment also made an appearance in "Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter.")

Litvak is already thinking about using the cinecollage process on other historical movies, including one about California's gold rush.

"It used to be if you wanted to tell a wonderful story from our nation's past, you could only do that if somebody was going to give you $100 million," he said. "Now we can take a great story like this on a very modest budget and we can get it into theaters. There are so many wonderful stories that can be told this way."

richard.verrier@latimes.com

Where the cameras roll: Sample of neighborhoods with permitted TV, film and commercial shoots scheduled this week. Permits are subject to last-minute changes. Sources: FilmL.A. Inc., cities of Beverly Hills, Pasadena and Santa Clarita. Thomas Suh Lauder / Los Angeles Times

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Obama ramps up pressure on GOP to avert budget cuts

WASHINGTON -- With less than two weeks before across-the-board spending cuts begin taking effect, President Obama is cranking up pressure on congressional Republicans to agree to a Democratic plan that would temporarily block the deep reductions.

Obama is scheduled to speak Tuesday on the need to prevent the cuts, known in Washington as a sequester, appearing at a White House event with first responders -- people whose jobs might be lost if the federal government slashes budgets as scheduled on March 1, according to a White House official.

The president plans to endorse a Democratic plan that would replace the across-the-board cuts with more targeted reductions, as well as new taxes on some people making more than $1 million.

"The president will challenge Republicans to make a very simple choice: do they protect investments in education, health care and national defense or do they continue to prioritize and protect tax loopholes that benefit the very few at the expense of middle and working class Americans?" said the official, who would not be named discussing the plans.

Obama's event will be the latest step in his public campaign to cast his Republican opponents as standing in the way of  "balanced" deficit reduction, an effort he has pursued since the election and which he  highlighted in his State of the Union speech last week.

The president says he wants to curb government spending, but any deal must include new tax revenue from changes to the tax code and protect entitlements.

GOP leaders also say they want to avert the blunt spending cuts -- which were enacted as part of a 2011 budget deal as a way to force a compromise.

Nonpartisan experts say the cuts would eliminate hundreds of thousands of jobs and slow the recovery.

But Republicans argue that new taxes should not be included in the alternative. House Speaker John Boehner, (R-Ohio) said last week the cuts were likely to hit unless lawmakers agreed on a long-term plan that dramatically cuts government spending and eliminates the deficit over the next decade.

A Boehner spokesman said it was time for the Senate to find an alternative.

"We agree the sequester is a bad way to cut spending. That's why we've twice passed a plan to replace it with common sense cuts and reforms that don't threaten our security, safety, and economy," said spokesman Brendan Buck. "A solution now requires the Senate -- controlled by the president's party -- to finally pass a plan of their own."

Senate Republicans are expected propose their own temporary alternative, which would curb the growth of the federal workforce.

The White House is continuing with the strategy that has yielded success in the past -- using the president's megaphone and a popular proposal to pressure Congress on deadline. That tactic successfully forced Republicans to agree to raise income taxes on top earners as part of last month's fiscal cliff deal. That deal also delayed the sequester for two months.

The Democrats are proposing another 10 month delay, replacing half the cuts with the so-called Buffett Rule, a requirement that those who have adjusted gross incomes above $1 million pay a minimum 30% tax rate.

The rule, an early staple in Obama's reelection campaign, is named for billionaire Warren Buffett, who has said that tax loopholes and deductions allow him to pay a lower effective tax rate than his secretary.

The Democratic proposal includes $55 billion in new revenue, along with cuts to farm subsidies and a smaller hit to defense spending than is scheduled.

[For the Record, 5:22 a.m. PST  Feb. 19: This post has been updated to include a statement from Boehner's spokesman.]

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Kathleen.hennessey@latimes.com

Twitter: @khennessey

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Alec Baldwin, NY Post photog file harass claims

NEW YORK (AP) — New York City police are investigating harassment complaints made by actor Alec Baldwin and a New York Post photographer after an altercation.

According to police, photographer G.N. Miller says the former "30 Rock" star yelled racial epithets and other insults when he was trying to take pictures of the actor outside his Manhattan apartment. Baldwin maintains he hollered at the photographer, but never said anything racist. He called the allegations "outrageous."

Baldwin called police and filed a harassment complaint Monday after the incident. The photographer later filed a cross-complaint.

The police department's Hate Crimes Task force was looking into the allegations.

A Post spokeswoman had no immediate comment on Tuesday.

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National Briefing | South: Abortion Curbs Clear Senate in Arkansas

The State Senate voted 25 to 7 on Monday to ban most abortions 20 weeks into a pregnancy. The measure goes back to the House to consider an amendment that added exceptions for rape and incest. The legislation is based on the belief that fetuses can feel pain 20 weeks into a pregnancy, and is similar to bans in several other states. Opponents say it would require mothers to deliver babies with fatal conditions. Gov. Mike Beebe has said he has constitutional concerns about the proposal but has not said whether he will veto it.

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Former Obama campaign staffers parlay innovations into start-ups

WASHINGTON — As chief technology officer for President Obama's reelection effort, Harper Reed oversaw the development of projects such as Narwhal, an intricate platform that linked the campaign's myriad databases and allowed officials to plot strategy with new precision.

The heady and exhausting 19-month gig convinced Reed, former technology officer for the online T-shirt retailer Threadless, that he should launch his own venture.

"When you go from building T-shirts to software for a presidential campaign used by a cast of millions, it's pretty easy to think, 'OK, we can build something pretty big,'" Reed said.

He and his business partner, Dylan Richard, the campaign's former director of engineering, now are "looking to do something large" with their new business software start-up, he said. They're not the only ones.

Obama's 50,000-square-foot campaign headquarters on the sixth floor of a Chicago office tower also served during the campaign as a business incubator, which now is generating new ventures that seek to parlay its innovations into private-sector enterprises.

Some are classically political. Last month, senior field staffers Mitch Stewart and Jeremy Bird launched 270 Strategies, a political consulting shop offering clients the kind of data-driven organizing model that helped Obama win.

And Katie Ingebretson and Karine Jean-Pierre, who helped run campaign operations in battleground states, opened a communications and government relations firm in Los Angeles last year.

But the new ventures go beyond political consulting firms. Some of the Obama team's top technologists and data crunchers, including former chief analytics officer Daniel Wagner and product developer Mari Huertas, are contemplating their own tech start-ups.

Their business projects are still in the planning stages, but the new entrepreneurs already have a receptive audience in Silicon Valley.

"The credibility earned by being part of the core Obama campaign team couldn't be higher," said Chris Sacca, a venture investor and Obama fundraiser who has backed companies such as Twitter Inc., Uber Technologies Inc. and Bitly Inc.

"Point to another company that goes from zero to $525 million raised digitally in less than two years," he wrote in an email.

The initial products that Obama campaign veterans pitch may be less important than their pedigree, said Scott Weiss, a partner at the venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz. He already has had informal talks with some former staffers.

Weiss, who co-founded the Internet security firm IronPort Systems Inc. in San Bruno, Calif., noted that the campaign offered a rare opportunity to build "a system that had to hold so much load and be so bulletproof in a short amount of time."

"If you think about the pressure cooker of putting the smartest people together to fix a hard problem like that, it's almost like going through Navy SEAL training together," he said. "Of course they are going to come up with a lot of innovative, creative things."

The keen interest in the nascent start-ups speaks to how a presidential campaign functions as a testing ground for new ideas — as well as a potentially lucrative calling card for political operatives.

"There is something inherently entrepreneurial about a presidential campaign, if you're doing it right," said Joe Rospars, a founding partner of Blue State Digital, the go-to Democratic digital consulting firm that emerged from Howard Dean's 2004 presidential bid.

"It's such an interesting challenge to build an organization from scratch that you know is going to go out of business," Rospars said.

Obama's two presidential bids offered particularly ripe environments for out-of-the-box thinking, starting in 2007 when he was running as an underdog first-term U.S. senator.

"We just had to be innovative," said Stewart, who started out as the campaign's Iowa caucus director.

Dan Siroker, a Google Inc. product manager who took a leave to volunteer on Obama's first bid, had the idea to run what are called A/B tests on the campaign website, a tactic that measures the effectiveness of different design elements. The resulting product led to a surge of email sign-ups on the homepage and got him hired to run the analytics team.

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